One Week Following
by RoseHarrow
Summary: A revised epilogue with much melodramatic scheming and Hermione-related brilliance.


**One Week Following the 'Final Battle'**

**AKA the epilogue to end all epilogues**

**Disclaimer: **All Harry Potter characters mentioned in this story are J.K. Rowling's. They are used with love and respect for her original creations. No copyright infringement is intended.

Each morning Harry ran around the lake. He went ppast Dumbledore's tribute. Past that the memorial.

And past that spot, that place where he had entered the woods, that place he had thrown the stone and hoped to any passing deity that his foolishness would actually work.

Each morning Harry wondered if it had been worth it.

Ginny was, well, as good as dead. His little sister, hit by a stone monument in the most strenuous moments of the last battle.

He hadn't been able to help her.

Ron was off somewhere with the other members of his family. The Weasleys had stayed around long enough to assure him that they didn't blame him, in any way, for the fall of Percy and Ginny, and they had left. Left to Merlin only knew where, leaving Hermione and Harry to fend for themselves.

Hermione... well, Hermione had surprised them all. In the wake of the battle she had, quite suddenly and without any reasons remotely connected to a lack of true compatibility, broken off her fragile relationship with Ron. A relationship barely started by any account.

She now spent her days in the company of the unlikely and strange where she, Luna and Draco Malfoy had been glimpsed in intense conversation which Harry refused to think had any link to himself, even with the odd glances two-thirds of their party tended to direct his way.

Malfoy, on the other hand, never met his gaze.

They all seemed, in general, relatively happy.

And every morning Harry came to the same train of thought.

He was, to put it frankly, mildly pissed that all his efforts had reaped such poor results.

He had all the status a boy could ever wish. Most of which he could have done without.

He was wealthy, with a double inheritance.

He even had the beginnings of a family with the presence of his godchild, Teddy Lupin, who had be err... bequeathed to him following Andromeda's inability to care for the boy.

What he didn't have was a relationship.

That wasn't to say the opportunity wasn't there. Not at all. What with killing Voldemort and possessing a certain amount of boyish charm, there was no shortage of proposals from young women while their older equals restrained themselves and only created a fan society aka 'Potter Mums'.

No, it wasn't the lack of options that was the problem. It was that they came from the entirely wrong gender.

You see, Harry Potter was gay and he wasn't sure what to do about it.

He had, so far, come up with two plans to solve this problem. And he had to admit, if only to himself, that they each reeked of desperation and his tendency towards melodramatic announcements.

The first was fairly simple; he would simply take out an ad in the Daily Prophet and would advertise his availability in conjunction with a clear outline of his sexual preference.

It would go something along the lines of:

Available: Single male, young and active.

Recent slayer of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named.

Looking for good time and companionship.

Male responses only.

Only Harry felt that a) his writing skills left a lot to be desired and b) that the advertisement might not be taken with seriously.

So, with some reluctance, he allowed that Plan One was probably not the way to go.

The second was more difficult to undertake though the end result would, hopefully, be satisfactory, where he, Harry Potter, would ask a known homosexual man on a date. As a result of which he would, hopefully, end up with a real, live boyfriend.

Yet, as it turned out, Harry was in need of neither of these extremely well thought out and interesting plans. Mostly because this particular writer has places to be and is in no way prepared to go into a major plot development involving numerous interesting incidents and an accident with a cucumber.

And partly because it seemed that while Harry was running, extremely slowly, around the lake, Hermione Granger was plotting with her two new friends.

Miss Granger had always been a clever girl so it comes as no surprise to the reader that she was the first to pick up on Mr Potter's aforementioned preferences. Indeed she had noticed at a time no later than sixth year where Harry's interest in a certain male student had been a little too intense, a little too heated, to be explained by rivalry and suspected Death Eater-related alliances.

So, she resolved, she would give her near brother a treat- a reward as such for finally taking down the most evil wizard to walk the earth since Grindelwald. She was going to give him a boy. And she knew just the individual to talk to about it.

So it was that while Harry was trailing Malfoy suspecting him of doing Merlin-knew-what in the Room of Requirement, Hermione was meeting with the head of the family itself and doing far more for the war effort.

Narcissa Malfoy appeared to most, a vain and inconsiderate woman who followed the dictates of fashion and her husband (in that order) whilst spoiling her son with the delivery of excessive sweets and gifts.

However, as she and Hermione knew, she ruled her family with a silk glove, tactfully and subtly getting her way whilst appearing to cede to Lucius' whims. She and the industrious Miss Granger began the slow process of re-establishing the family loyalty to the somewhat saner side of Wizarding power and, when everything was good and permanent, informed Draco and Lucius of these changes.

And so the power of the Dark Lord was eliminated and peace restored to the Wizarding world, etc etc. And, more importantly, so Draco's fascination for all things Potter cultivated to an end first dreamt up by two intelligent women who only had political ambition and love on their minds. For Narcissa could now reinforce her influence of her beloved husband by this partnership, and Hermione, now secure in the future acceptance of same-sex couples in the magical world, was able to join with the girl of her dreams- one Luna Lovegood. Her antithesis in many ways, but one still intent on the research and learning which gave Hermione tingles whenever she contemplated it.

So, what is the point of this long and drawn out explanation?

It is both to rule out the possibilities of Hermione becoming romantically attached to Harry and the potential future betrayal of Harry by the Malfoys.

It also serves as an amusing, if long, side story which depicts the motives of the characters in ways which would otherwise escape the audience's notice.

In any case, as a result of this one morning, as Harry continued to make his way around the lake, he was met by a certain individual of the same age who possessed blond hair and piercing grey eyes. This boy proceeded to confess his adoration of our hero and his intent to join him in a relationship which would be satisfactory to all parties involved.

Harry, unaware of the presence of gleeful schemers in the bushes, answered Draco Malfoy's request with a kiss.

And, the rest, as they say, is history.

Though, as a happy side note, it should be noted that no epilogue detailing the events nineteen years following is necessary given that such a conclusion is impossible at this time, and that, with different relationships, names such as Albus Severus and Scorpius Hyperion are hardly necessary.

The End


End file.
